The Billionaire You Know
by sapphireswimming
Summary: Because there's only one person Crowley would trust with something as important as this.


I didn't know how much I needed these two characters to have a crossover scene together until the middle of last night, when I blindly reached for a pen and paper to write a note to myself so that I wouldn't forget. Since then, I've gotten three possible scenes I'd like to write all jumping into my head at once, but of course, I smashed my finger yesterday and am finding it next to impossible to type anything out right now. So here you go! A work of devolving apocalyptic silliness brought to you despite intense pain and suffering so you had better enjoy it. XD

**Timelines:** For Danny Phantom, while Vlad's still living in Wisconsin, so before season 3. In Supernatural, around the events of 5.20 (_The Devil You Know_), which, yes, is the basis of my shamelessly altered title because I'm not clever enough to think of anything else.

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**The Billionaire You Know**

September 4, 2013

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Crowley popped up in the main hall of the Masters mansion. The one in Wisconsin that looked like a gaudy, oversized castle and fit the owner's personality quite perfectly.

Looking around at the garish green and gold furnishings hanging from the walls, though, Crowley had a moment of doubt about his reasons for coming. But he shoved them aside as he had already made his decision. The half ghost was the best person to come to in his situation. He wasn't sure that there was anyone else in the world, or underworld, or afterlife, really, that he would have trusted quite so much. Not with something like this.

So he turned around in a circle, casting about him with a searching air as he looked through the over the top team spirited banners, then nodded tersely in satisfaction as he discovered where he needed to go.

Teleporting into the billionaire's sitting room, he found the silver haired man sitting in an oversized armchair with a cup of tea in hand and a fluffy white cat (a horrid, evil looking thing with beady red eyes and this, besides the fact that he appreciated his faithful, obedient hellhounds, was why he was more of a dog person) on his lap, covering his immaculate designer suit with innumerable strands of clinging fur.

The man quirked an eyebrow as Crowley suddenly appeared in front of him out of thin air, but continued to calmly sip his tea as if this were an everyday occurrence for him, which, as Crowley thought about it, might be the case, since he was, in fact, part ghost, and worked with the invisible undead on a daily basis.

The cat on his lap hissed at the demon, who hadn't yet moved.

"Maddie," Vlad murmured to calm his feline companion with a touch of his hand, but said nothing to his visitor, waiting for him to make the first move.

"Ah," Crowley began with a tilt of his head in greeting. He resisted the urge to smooth out his waistcoat which had shifted about in his rapid string of teleportations, but he didn't want to make himself look any more frazzled than he actually was.

"Sorry to pop in on you unannounced like this, Masters," he began. He honestly would have let the man know he was coming if it had been under any other circumstances, but desperate times…

At this, Vlad set down his cup of tea and regarded the demon more closely. "Masters?" he questioned. "Not… Plasmius?" he asked with a quirk of his lip as he slightly sneered his other name just as the demon had said it to him during their last meeting.

Crowley shifted his weight. "Not quite sure what the etiquette is when you're in this form, love," he grinned, hoping that it would get him out of any hot water he'd accidentally stepped into. Or left boiling.

After all, he was the one trespassing on the man, and he was the one about to ask the favor. It wouldn't do to start out on the wrong foot. Especially not now when he seemed to have no friends left. The Winchesters were probably the closest things he could call to allies right now, aside from Vlad, and wasn't that the biggest cosmic joke he'd ever heard of?

Every demon in Hell or on Earth was looking for him and Crowley was currently topping the devil's hit-list right behind his oversized meat suit, something that would have been a bragging point at one time but right now was just a huge pain in the... well, literally everything. He was currently without a home or safe house of any kind, unless you could count hiding under a rock as either being safe or acting as any kind of house. He couldn't go anywhere or do anything. Teleporting was the only safe way to travel and while it kept him from being spotted by underworld agents looking to stake him on burning brands, it made him frazzled, and a little green in the face by the end of the day.

But enough of that. He needed to focus on this, because while he could handle all the rest, there was one vital detail left unresolved.

He put on his best winning smile as the silence stretched on and hoped that the billionaire hadn't come to mistrust it as the Winchesters had. Never could tell with these part human types.

Vlad searched Crowley's face with piercing eyes, but apparently saw all he needed to know because a minute later, he was picking up his tea again and asking if the demon wanted some too.

"If you don't mind," Crowley said as he allowed a genuine smile to cross his face. "Hell's tea isn't fit for human consumption and I wouldn't dream of touching the coffee." He shuddered. "The stuff's like demonic sludge. Saw a torturer let it crawl all over his soul once. Wasn't pretty."

Vlad nodded understandingly and pressed the button on the intercom sitting on the table beside him. "Some more tea, please, George."

Within seconds, a ghost appeared with a tea tray, steaming and aromatic, and deposited it on the table before disappearing again.

It was Crowley's turn to stare in disbelief. Even in Hell, his underlings had never been quite so quick to oblige any given order. And never brought tea that smelled as nice as that. Not that he'd ever necessarily ordered anyone to do something that politely, but, hey, it was Hell, and even though people occasionally said "to Hell with politeness," (or, at least, he did and he was sure that someone else had said it in the course of human history) it generally didn't find its way there.

"Quite a system you've got set up here," he said, when he found the half ghost staring at him.

"Hmm," the man agreed. Then, "Help yourself. And feel free to sit down." He gestured at a variety of other overly tall and rustically decorated chairs littered around the room that looked as if no one had sat in them for decades, although the one closest to him appeared free from spider webs, so he chose to take it without searching for one a little less… free of antlers.

Beggars can't be choosers and all that. And didn't that add salt to the wound, but what could he do? He'd never been one to sugar coat the truth, even when it could have done with having a fair bit of county fair cotton candy spun round it.

"Thanks," Crowley said briefly once he'd been settled with the best cup of tea he'd had since he'd died and allowed himself to relax back into his seat, closing his eyes for the briefest of moments and letting the warm liquid run across his tongue.

At this point, Vlad could hardly remain quiet any longer. He knew, of course, that his guest, a former crossroads demon alternatively teaming up with the world's most renowned hunters against the forces of Hell and trying to find ways to double cross them, was anything but ordinary, but this had been some extremely odd behavior, even for him.

He had a dapper, rarely unflappable demeanor and better manners than most supernatural creatures Vlad had met, but he had never been this subservient and thankful before. He wanted to know exactly what political changes had preceded this change in attitude, but, unfortunately for his curiosity, knew better than to press the issue prematurely. Fortunately, unlike Crowley, patience was one of the man's strong suits.

As the silence lengthened, his opportunity presented itself. After all, this demon had come unannounced into his house and he deserved to know what had brought him here. Even though he would need to find out with a bit more tact than that, so he coughed lightly and asked, "So what can I do for you?"

Crowley nearly choked on his tea at the interruption of the silence he'd grown accustomed to. "What can you do for me?" He asked, as if this kind of idea had never entered his head.

"Yes, Crowley," Vlad replied with well amused patience. "I know you didn't drop by just to chat with me."

The demon mustered up his best grin. "How did you know I didn't just come by for the tea?" he asked with a quirk of his lips. "Very good, by the way."

"I'll be sure to tell George," Vlad said nonplussed. "But that wasn't why you came here either, was it?" He asked, although he already knew the answer to his question.

With anyone else, Crowley might have played off of it, prolonged the game a bit more, but he really wasn't in a position to do such a thing. So he finally admitted, "No. No, it wasn't."

"Hmm," Vlad hummed before taking another sip. Not saying anything, but obviously encouraging his visitor to elaborate further.

Crowley sighed and sat back in his chair as he decided how on earth to begin. "I don't know how connected you are to my kind of politics," he began, "but all of these natural disasters, your stock, and everyone else's, plummeting? All that other crazy stuff going on in the world right now?" He leaned forward, eyes intent upon his host. "It's the apocalypse."

Vlad leaned forward now, too, knocking the cat off his lap and not giving her a second glance as she growled at the disruption of her nap and finally decided to stalk out the door in favor of being ignored by her human in the room. "Are you serious?" He finally asked, the expression on his face caught between not believing what had to be an elaborate joke, being horrified at the revelation, and being justified in knowing that something had been very wrong with the world for a long time. Even more wrong than usual.

"Deadly, love," Crowley replied.

Vlad sat back with his fingers interlaced beneath his chin, rearranging his opinions of current events in light of the fact that they were, in fact, mid-apocalypse.

"And where do you fit into all this?" he finally asked.

Crowley cringed. _Not on the winning side, obviously, or I wouldn't be crawling to you for help_, was what he wanted to say, but bit back the smart remark.

"It's all a bit up in the air right now," Crowley hedged.

Vlad pierced him with a stare.

"Oh, alright, fine, you caught me," the demon said heatedly before taking another sip from his teacup. "Thing's aren't so great for me at the moment." He swallowed heavily and looked at the ground.

"You see, I don't want Lucifer taking over the world. He'll destroy half the planet if he gets in charge and there go my playing grounds, you see? Besides the fact that if there's anything he hates worse than humans it's demons. And since he's willing to sacrifice every single person on earth to get in control again, you see why I don't want him in charge of me and mine."

"Yes, I do see your point," Vlad said quietly.

"So I've decided to throw in my lot with the bloody Winchesters," Crowley threw up his hands as if this was the last straw in his life falling apart. "Gave them the colt."

"The what, now?" Vlad asked, tilting to one side to avoid the splash of tea headed his way.

"A gun that's supposed to be able to kill anything in the world," the demon took the time to explain as he got up to pace the room. "Only, it didn't, see. Because Lucifer's still walking around. Only now he knows that I gave them the gun and he's not so keen on the idea that I'm the one still walking."

He put a hand up to his mouth for a moment, before turning back to the billionaire still seated in his armchair.

"They've come for me," he finally managed to say. "They burnt down my house. I've been on the run and if I had anyone still friendly enough to write me any mail, it would need to be addressed to the bloody rock in the middle of the bloody swamp in the middle of bloody nowhere! But that's not the worst of it," he said, breathing heavily as he walked up to Vlad until he stood directly in front of him.

"They ate my tailor," he whispered venomously.

It was here that Vlad's face changed, taking on a devastated look he'd not allowed until then. He glanced at the demon's unusually disheveled appearance and revised his opinion that the man's standards had been slipping. Not only had he been living under a rock in the swamp, but he had no tailor to go to for a change of clothes!

The sheer loss of talent leaving the world with a single life was astonishing. It was all too hard to find a tailor nowadays who truly understood the drape and fit of a good suit. Looking perfectly suave and dapper at every moment of the day was not an easy feat. To have lost your only avenue of pursuing it in a single go!

Vlad finally met Crowley's gaze, horrified. "They ate your tailor?" he asked, voice hoarse.

Crowley nodded glumly before his face became set in a grim expression. "You can see why I had to come to you, then! You're the only person I can talk to. I can't trust just anyone with finding a suitable replacement. You've seen how some of these fellows dress these days. No taste at all. No, it's unthinkable. It had to be you!"

Vlad nodded wordlessly, the wheels in his head furiously turning.

"Do you have something in mind?" Crowley asked, as hopefully as he'd ever asked anything in his afterlife.

"Yes," Vlad replied tersely before walking to the far side of the room and making a quick call on his cell phone.

Crowley was unable to make out the hushed undertones, but when the man came back with a rare smile on his face, he knew that the risk had been worth it and that everything would work out fine, now. He could do anything when he was dressed for the part.

"He'll be here within the hour. And I've found a full ghost for you. Can't die, so you won't have to worry about finding a replacement every half century, and anyone trying to eat him would be hard pressed to get through it without a stomach ache. They don't care about politics out here, above or below, in the Ghost Zone either, so you don't have to worry about him telling anyone where you are or someone trying to make him talk. You demons haven't figured out how to make ghosts tell you what you want yet."

Crowley almost looked offended at that, but realized that now was neither the time nor place to argue when he realized that the man was probably right, so he filed the information away for later use and exploration.

Vlad clapped a comforting hand to the demon's shoulder. "Time to get you properly suited up so we can put this all behind us as nothing more than an unpleasant memory."

Crowley heartily agreed.

"More tea?" Vlad offered, handing over a freshly filled cup.

Crowley took it with a genuine smile. It may have been the middle of the apocalypse, and he may not have stood a snowball's chance, but perhaps not everything was falling to pieces, he thought as he eyed this man, his dapperly dressed partner in crime, who wasn't going to let him down as everything else around him had.

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.  
_~ "They ate my tailor!" ~  
._


End file.
